Lesson Plan 3:

Westward expansion:

Grade 4

1 Class Period

Objectives:

  • To familiarize the students with westward expansion
  • To get the students to understand what was happening

Standard:

-I.1.3: Place major events in the early history of the United States in chronological order

Materials List:

  • Map of the US on the board
  • Map of the expansion:

Activity:

  1. Go through the four major steps of westward expansion
  2. Lesson will be extended from previous lesson on the first 13 colonies (pink portion on the map)
  3. Why would people want to move?
  4. More land and opportunities
  5. Ask the students what direction they can move in and what is to the east?
  6. Atlantic Ocean is to the east
  7. Appalachian Mountains is to the west
  8. The end of the Revolution
  9. Gives the US what is now Michigan and Ohio towards Mississippi River (Point out on the map on the board)
  10. Louisiana Purchase (1830)
  11. President Jefferson wanted to move into the Louisiana territory but it was owned by France and would be considered trespassing
  12. Napoleon of France offered to sell the Louisiana territory to the US (The Mississippi to the Rockies and The Gulf of Mexico to Canada- Yellow portion on the map)
  13. The Mexican American War (1846)
  14. The US claimed Texas as part of the country so they went to war with Mexico. When the US won, the country was now owned the purple and light red areas on the map
  15. Treaty with England
  16. The Astoria Settlement of 1811 and the Florida Treaty of 1819 gave the US the green area around Oregon and what is now Florida
  17. Have the students go through the basic steps of westward expansion
  18. Set the classroom to represent a map of the United States
  19. Students all crowded together on one wall (Atlantic Ocean)
  20. The students can not go there to live and expand
  21. Desks more against the other wall (Appalachian Mountains)
  22. Explain the surroundings and see if the students can figure out how we expanded
  23. The Atlantic Ocean is to the East and so you can’t go there to live
  24. The Appalachian Mountains is to the west and runs down the middle of the 13 colonies
  25. The mountains blocked the settlers from moving westward until certain events happened
  26. Tell the students they want to settle across the whole classroom ( The United States), the other wall is the Pacific Ocean
  27. Steps and movements that students should make based on what they just learned:
  28. What happened first in the expansion of the US?
  29. The end of the Revolution
  30. What direction should we move in?
  31. Toward the front of the classroom
  32. What happened next?
  33. The Louisiana Purchase
  34. How should we move?
  35. Across the classroom to double the size of what they are now
  36. What happened next?
  37. The Mexican American War
  38. What direction should we move?
  39. Into the southeast part of the room all the way to the wall
  40. What happened last?
  41. Treaty with England
  42. Where do we move?
  43. The rest of the room

Closure:

Ask the students if they have any questions? If they are confused, go through the steps again. Tell the students that they learned about the major events of westward expansion.

Assessment:

Did the students understand the basic steps of westward expansion?

Were the students able to move across the room in the pattern of westward expansion?

Give the students a blank map of the US and have them color in the regions of westward expansion. (Like the map that was on the board during the lesson)

G/T and Disabled:

Gifted and Talented: When asking questions, challenge the G/T students with more in dept answers, like the years and why they would want that to happen. In order for them to know some of the in depth answers, they will need to do a little more research before we do this project.

Disabled: If a student is disabled and not able to keep up as well with the class, give the student some written steps of the expansion and their own map to follow along